Tuberculosis remains a public health problem in Botswana.
Assistant Minister of Health, Dr Alfred Madigele, noted in parliament last week that the TB incidence in Botswana was about 8 400 cases in 2014.
Dr Madigele announced that the country had reported 104 cases of multidrug-resistant TB cases in 2014 and 14 cases of extremely drug-resistant TB since 2007.
"That notwithstanding, mortality from TB has been going down over the years from 15 per cent in 2002 to six per cent in the 2013 cohort." He said. Dr Madigele also highlighted that Botswana was one of the only four countries in the SADC region to reach the Millennium Development Goal target of reversing the incidence, prevalence and mortality from TB.
He highlighted that TB was about to be defeated, but with the advent of HIV, which depresses the immune system, there appeared an upsurge of TB, leading to HIV/TB co-infection that reversed the gain of TB control.
The hardest hit districts by TB, Dr Madigele said, include Ghanzi, Kgalagadi North and South, Kweneng East and Gaborone. He however said that strategies were in place to mitigate the impact of TB.
"There are five specialised care centres for drug resistant TB in the country. The community TB care is currently the best practice strategy used to simplify TB treatment to patient," said. Dr Madigele further explained that the infectious disease, which is caused by mycobacterium tuberculosis bacteria, commonly affects the lungs and is transmitted from person to person through droplets from the throat and lungs of people with TB.
He noted that the active respiratory disease can affect many organs by spreading through the blood, including the bone, the intestines, the brain, the liver and the kidneys.
"In healthy people, infection with TB often causes no symptoms since the person's immune system acts to keep it in check," he said.
But when there is an incident of stresses that depresses the immune system, he said, TB infection manifests itself.
He however stated that TB was treatable with a six-month course of anti TB drugs, which is a combination of at least three drugs. He said if the pills are not taken accordingly, TB becomes resistant to treatment and turns into a multidrug-resistant TB.
Dr Madigele was answering a question in Parliament from MP for Okavango, Mr Bagalatia Aron on behalf of the minister.
Mr Aron had asked the minister to brief Members of Parliament about the situation of TB in Botswana, and to further sate the most affected areas in Botswana as well as to state strategies in place to address the situation.
Source: Botswana Daily News